#73 (AFI):
Monkey Business
Year: 1931
Directed by: Norman Z. McLeod
Written by: Ben Hecht, Will B. Johnstone, S.J. Perelman, Roland Pertwee, Arthur Sheekman
Starring: Groucho, Harpo, Chico, and Zeppo Marx
Seanbaby: We here at the IFLS loved the idea of taking an old expression like "monkey business" and then making a movie out of it! But the fact that there were no actual monkeys in it shows that the makers didn't reread the words "monkey business" enough times. Hey, Groucho and Chico, did you miss the word "monkey"?
Monkey Fact from the CC2K: When Dom DeLuise and Jimmy Walker made Going Bananas, the expression they chose to make a movie around barely referenced monkey food yet the humans still thought to hire a monkey actor. THAT TALKED. It is true that the monkey could not really talk without the magic of special effects, but it later really learned sign language in order to tell its agent to fuck himself.
Mark: All those people all learned their lesson in the end. Jimmy Walker isn't allowed to work anymore, Dom DeLuise is fat, Groucho Marx is dead, and the talking monkey is getting mascara jammed in its eyes by a makeup company.
Erik: The IMDB shows that a film called Monkey Business is made once every two years, with the off years being filled by Tony Danza's Goin' Ape! (pictured). Leave it to the AFI, then, to pick the only one from that huge pool of candidates that doesn't feature any actual apes. The Marx Brothers can be funny, but, let's face it, they're no monkeys.
IFLS Fact: The original version of the Calculando Calrissian 2000 was programmed to disqualify any movie that could be made funnier by simply replacing the entire cast with chimps. It seemed like a good test, but unfortunately it quickly became apparent that *every* movie is funnier that way. Except for Schindler's List, which gets sadder when all the cute monkeys get killed. So using that original theory, our top 100 comedies were Schindler's List 100 times. Though technically accurate according to the formula, the results might have been misconstrued, so we abandoned them.
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#73 (IFLS):
The Story of Ricky
Year: 1989
Directed by: Ngai Kai Lam
Written by: Ngai Kai Lam
Starring: Sui-wong Fan, Philip Kwok, Jean Pol, Gloria Yip, Daan Bob Chit Long, Cheng Chuen Yam, Faan Mooi Saang
Seanbaby: This is the perfect mix of exploding heads, martial arts, and prison drama. Something the Internet Movie Database might call "a mix of Scanners, Stand by Me, and Groundhog Day." But because of the giant cultural gap between the makers of Story of Ricky and our country where monster tentacles never think to rape our women, I can't tell how much of the humor in this movie was intentional. Whether it is or it isn't, it triple backflip kicks Jackie Chan's comedy off a motorcycle and into a crocodile's mouth. I wish someone would have told Jackie that the true key to hilarity isn't punching someone in the balls until their face puckers up. It's punching someone in the balls until your hand comes out their back at the same time a stage hand throws a bucket of red oatmeal on the camera.
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